thomas RODEMEIER: the city of siegen is dominated by an omnipresent elevated road. and although it is situated next to a river, there is no access to the water. though the item of contamination makes us think of something negative at first, it also describes the act of merging and diffusion. in order to acknowledge this right the hostel was designed. indeed merging and diffusion are positive terms in contemporary architecture.

university of siegen

instructors: ulrich EXNER and dietrich PRESSEL

according to that it is requested that the item contamination keeps its provocative tone in the context of architecture. the building itself is provocative since it somehow rebels against the buildings that already exist. it goes beyond the frontiers of the site and represents an interruption of the original literal sense of the latin term contamination.

by now, the neologism “centrifugium” is to be understood as a contamination in the literary sense as well: it combines the terms “centrifuge” and “refugium” by merging these morphological overlapping words into one new item.

sP: what or who influenced this project?

tR: natural things like twisters, origami, the work of ben van berkel, wolf d. prix and daniel libeskind as well as my mentors ulrich exner and dietrich pressel, who gave me plenty of rope

sP: what were you reading/listening to/watching while developing this project?

tR: un studio and j. meyer h. music by the notwist, the cat empire and bloc party